Wannabes
by kepulver
Summary: G1 Vortex gets a chance to strut his stuff as an interrogator.


**Wannabes:**

Shockwave turned as Vortex entered the room. The smaller Combaticon flyer was streaked with muck and mud that appeared to have been hastily wiped at in an effort to clean him up.

"You're late," he said, looking down at Vortex.

"Onslaught was running gestalt training drills." Vortex's rotors spun lazily as he walked over to Shockwave, only to slouch insolently in front of him. "We were merged when the call came in an' Bruticus is really bad about passing on messages he gets. So, what's up?"

"We have an Autobot prisoner," Shockwave said. "The interrogators we have in there now are having little to no success. Megatron wants you to see what you can do."

"Who's in there now?" Vortex's rotors spun faster. "Ohh, is it Laserbeak? Tell me I get to clean up Laserbeak's mess, Shockwave and I'll erase half the graffiti about you in the commissary!"

Shockwave looked into Vortex's eagerly flickering optics. "Laserbeak is off on a more important assignment with Soundwave. The interrogators on duty are a pair from Polyhex, they came highly recommended by the city commander there. He'll be punished for that."

Vortex's optics fluttered. "Uh-huh," he said. "What's their names?"

"Lord Beligierus the Death-Sword and Lady Interigatrix the Dark-Vixen," said a booming voice from the opposite side of the room. Shockwave and Vortex turned to see a pair of perfectly matched twin Seekers striking a pose in the doorway. The left-hand Seeker was male; the right-hand one, female.

"Really, Lord Shockwave," said the male, striding forward. "I hardly see the need to bring in this...dabbler. We simply need more time with the prisoner. There is no way an Autobot can withstand our combined skills. My sister-consort and I are..."

"A pair of poseurs," Vortex said, his voice flat, "who couldn't get directions from an atlas."

"You know them?"

"I know their kind," Vortex said, walking in a slow circle around the Lord and Lady, who glared at him with baleful optics. "His lordship here looks to be a pretty typical specimen of the Dark and Brooding School of Decepticon Twittery. Note the black and red glossy armor carefully and artificially aged to give him the appearance of being many more vorns old than he really is. The added lights behind the optics to give them that extra bright glow is a nice touch but was out of style even before I was imprisoned.

"Now, as for his 'sister-consort' -- and doesn't that idea just make my processor lag -- here, there's just so much wrongness I don't know where to begin. Should I start with the fiber optic hair? The extra spiky jump boots? The energon-pink lips and the lightly fanged dentals for that primitive fuel-sucker touch?"

Shockwave watched Beligierus and Interigatrix as their expressions grew more and more incensed at Vortex's critiques of their appearance. Vortex, on the other hand, was the very picture of calm.

"But, hey, how they want to play dress-up isn't any of my business if they can do the job, right?" Vortex said, coming to a stop in front of the door leading to the interrogation chamber. "Let me see if I can guess at their technique: his Lordship stands around looking macho, arms crossed over his chest as he directs her Ladyship there to do whatever nasty things he can come up with? Am I close?"

"My sister is still learning the Craft," Beligierus said. "I am her instructor in the Way, and as such it is only well and right that I be there during her sessions with the prisoner."

"Right," Vortex said, pushing off from the wall and pacing again. "And the fact you get off on watching her go to town on some prisoner -- on the Empire's time -- is just a happy bonus. So, single tail or a cat?"

"A single-tail, of course," Interigatrix said, tossing her hair over her shoulder. "Much more painful."

"Quiet, sister," Beligierus said. "We have no need to explain ourselves to this impudent scoundrel."

"Scoundrel?" Vortex's rotors turned. "I like that. So, you've been whipping away at the prisoner in there since...how long have they had him, Shockwave?"

"Forty-three point three seven three four nine three breem," Shockwave said. "Approximately. I can give you more precise figures if you like."

"No, thanks," Vortex said. "Really. So, you two had forty-three breem with this guy and you spent, what? All of it beating the slag out of him?"

"We used other techniques," Beligierus said. "Though our methods are none of your concern."

"You had her beat him with the whip, then you probably slapped him around with those oversized spiky fists of yours," Vortex said, faceplate moving as he sniffed the air. "Ozone, right? Ahh, electrified fists, how classic. I presume both of you are aware of standard Imperial Interrogation Resistance Training?"

Beligierus glared at Vortex. "Of course," he said. "It's standard training for all Imperial soldiers."

"First thing you've said tonight that I can agree with," Vortex said. "Speaking of first things, I'm sure one of you two knows the first thing all recruits are taught in IIRT? Interigatrix? C'mon, sweetling, I know your head's for something other than holding up that hair of yours."

"Basic training requires recruits to be able to desensitize primary pain sensors in all sections of the body and to dull sensations on secondaries in order to thwart brute-force interrogations," Shockwave said.

"Correct!" Vortex whirled on Beligierus and Interigatrix, looking at them expectantly.

"What?" Interigatrix's voice was peevish, her lips pushed out into a pout. Something about her posture gave Shockwave the impression she longed to smack Vortex. It was a reaction he'd seen in many faced with the Combaticons' interrogator.

"Beligierus, c'mon, buddy, you have to know the answer I'm looking for!" Vortex turned to the other mech, waving a hand at him as if to encourage the answer to come out.

"My Lord Shockwave, I must protest this treatment!" Beligierus pushed roughly past Vortex. "This traitor is wasting our time! The prisoner is being allowed time to recover from the torture we've inflicted on him!"

"The prisoner," Vortex said, "is likely in there laughing his head off at the two rookies they sent in to work on him."

"How would you know this, Vortex?" Shockwave asked, holding up his hand to still Beligierus's angry protest.

"Because the prisoner knows the same desensitization techniques we do," Vortex said. "It's something we picked up from them back in the day. The Autobots were always a step ahead of us back then; I was one of the people who helped crack the technique. Scold allowed me to be included as a co-sub-publisher on her monograph on the subject."

"You worked with Scold?" For the first time, Beligierus looked at Vortex with an expression approaching grudging respect.

"Couple times," Vortex said. "She let me hold equipment when she worked. Sublime experience, lemme tell you. She could do things with a detailer that were just brutal."

Beligierus shifted uncomfortably, looking to Shockwave. "I...my techniques are well-proven. I have made a name for myself..."

"Among people who think interrogation is nothing more than whips and chains and unresolved sexual tension," Vortex said. "Shockwave, if you want your prisoner to have a kinky -- albeit boring -- time, keep these two. If you want this guy to actually talk, you can send me in. Choice is yours."

"Go," Shockwave said, gesturing to Beligierus and Interigatrix. "Vortex, go, do your work."

Interigatrix's protest was cut off abruptly by Beligierus's hand on her arm, jerking her toward the doorway. Shockwave followed Vortex into the interrogation chamber where the prisoner was chained to the wall, armor showing the rips and tears of a vicious beating.

"What? Their arms get tired?" the Autobot quipped.

"Nahh, we're done with the rookies," Vortex said, approaching the prisoner and studying him carefully. "Now, you get to deal with me."

"I'm shaking, really," the prisoner said. "You can't see it 'cause I'm tied up at the moment."

"Puns are the last refuge of a desperate mech." Vortex knelt down, opening a small hatch at the base of the Autobot's ankle. Pulling a set of tools from a hatch of his own, he began fiddling with the wires with in. "Lemme know when you feel something, okay?"

"What...what are you doing?"

"Wiring your primary pain sensors to your secondaries and turning the sensitivity on both sets up to maximum," Vortex said, sounding almost cheerful to Shockwave. "Then, we're gonna see how long it takes you to start talking while I run a buffer over those lash-marks of yours. And if that doesn't work, I've got some techniques I picked up on Earth that I've been dying to try out on somebody. For a species made up of walking, talking sacks of meat, they're downright inventive when it comes to hurting each other."

The prisoner groaned, face contorting as he fought the urge to scream as his pain sensors came on line. "I'll never talk!" The words came out as more of a groan than the growl the prisoner clearly had been trying for.

"Ooh, you're already resorting to cliches! Great!" Vortex said as he bounced back to his feet. "Then let's get started!"


End file.
